Al-Bustan Puts a Face and Story to Refugees in Philadelphia

March 01, 2022 Post a Comment

January. 05, 2017

My final task was in product and research at Fox News, and I had the unenviable task of putting quotes live, on air, during speeches and press conferences—you know, the bar on the bottom of the screen that reads something like "TRUMP: I KNOW THOSE WOMEN WANTED Information technology." Information technology was harrowing and depressing, considering it taught me what Trump's crowds truly responded to. For them, hearing Trump say "Crooked Hillary" was similar hearing Led Zeppelin play "Stairway To Heaven" alive in concert; likewise with "radical Islamic terrorism." But most unnerving of all was "The Serpent," an Al Wilson vocal whose lyrics Trump regularly read at rallies, about a adult female who finds a dying snake in the woods, nurses it back to health and is promptly bitten and killed by said serpent.

The audition was enraptured, every bit if they were hearing the Pope evangelize a homily. Pivot-driblet silence but for the man himself and the quick breaths he took in meaning, dramatic pauses. The audience,ten,000 white people in an air conditioned auditorium in Peoria, for instance, knew that they were the tender adult female, and that refugees were the snake, simply waiting to exist resuscitated so that they could fulfill their life's mission of killing, killing, killing. For a entrada tethered eternally to vulgarity, information technology was high art. And I'm sure that, for thousands of petrified Americans, it sounded similar a prophecy from on high.

They would cheer like mad when the verse form ends with the woman dying and asking the snake why it would practice such a thing later on she showed it such kindness. These are the starting time lines of the last verse, the crowd pleasers:

"Oh close up, silly woman," said the reptile with a grin
"You lot knew damn well I was a snake before you took me in."

I'm at Al-Bustan Seeds of Civilisation's refugee meet and greet at the Friends Center in Center City on a Sunday. It's an informal gathering for recent immigrants affiliated with Al-Bustan, an Arab arts and educational activity organization that operates in Philadelphia and has many arms, ranging from professional person development programs to arts projects. This meet and greet is the launch for a Pew-funded projection by Al-Bustan to artistically translate the stories of refugees and the internally displaced, and writers are milling about the oversupply listening to their tales of exodus and arrival in the U.S. The stories will fold into a music, fine art and poetry serial about the experiences of refugees, both foreign-built-in and local.

Near in the oversupply are from Syria and Iraq, and very piddling English language is being spoken, as the result is only open to immigrants and ane or two press folks. At that place'southward food—a lot of it—and coffee and music. There are little ones everywhere, sidling through the crowd and in and out of the master meeting room, where the event is being held. They're specially thrilled by a little station that the organizers have put together that allows the kids to be photographed property upwardly a alphabetic character of the Arabic alphabet while expressing themselves and playing with toys; an organizer takes the pictures and prints them on a piffling Epson printer, and the kids are beside themselves when they meet it.

Two kids catch my eye. They're playing that bottle game that has so entranced everyone betwixt the ages of 10 and xviii, the one where yous drinkable half of the water in a plastic canteen and try to flip information technology in the air then that it lands standing up; my baby brother does it all the time, uncontrollably. These two are Adnan and Abdullah. They fled their dwelling house city of Daraa, Syrian arab republic, two years ago, and spent fourth dimension in Hashemite kingdom of jordan and the United Arab Emirates earlier ending upwards in Philadelphia, and they really like information technology here. Daraa, they say, is no longer condom, and while their family unit is by and large located in Hashemite kingdom of jordan now, they have a grandfather who remains in Syrian arab republic.

Al-Bustan's mission is not but to create a community for refugees, merely to prove the earth who they are. They are Adnan and Abdullah, who play soccer, and Hafez Kotain, who leads the kids in a little drum circumvolve at the end of the event; they're the kids who run effectually the Friends Center, and the moms and dads who drink coffee and sing along with folk songs.

Daraa is really the epicenter of the Syrian Civil War. The violence started, you lot may call up, when the Assad authorities responded with extreme forcefulness to protests around the country in 2011; government forces killed as many equally 220 protesters and executed army defectors in Daraa in March and April of that year, at the height of the protests. It has since been a flashpoint in the disharmonize at that place, and has been controlled for a considerable amount of time by the opposition and assailed past opportunistic Islamic militant forces, including the al-Nusra Front. Adnan and Abdullah have probable seen and heard things that most of us never will, only only narrowly mention the discord when they talk about their hometown. Here they are in the Friends Center in Philadelphia, playing flip-the-bottle and getting cookies from the impressive potluck that Al-Bustan has put together.

"I similar information technology here considering of the weather, and I actually like school and my friends there," says Abdullah, "I really like it here because it'southward safe; at that place'south a park next to my house, and I like to play there." Abdullah and Adnan both play soccer, and Adnan makes information technology very clear that Abdullah assurance far harder than he does, and has even played with the Philadelphia Union's U16 squad.

Abdullah and Adnan, 14 and 15 respectively, are both polite, and pay more attention to my questions than a lot of grownup interviewees. They're simply kids doing kid stuff. Simply a lot of people would have you recollect it's more likely than not that these two are potential religious fanatics than regular goofy teens who can acclimate happily into American guild; afterwards all, near of the criticism around the influx of refugees into Europe revolves around the presence of teenaged and young adult males. Trump himself said that all Syrian refugees are "young, strong men," hinting at their potential to practice something nasty, and the foolishness of showing these young men any succor. Adnan and Abdullah, in the eyes of a lot of people who have been tricked into swallowing a dangerous narrative, are not goofy, athletic, happy-go-lucky school kids who have escaped hell.

They're the ophidian.

Information technology'southward impressive how quickly we forget our own history. At that place's a lot of Scots-Irish in my blood— and, therefore, a whole lot of Catholic—and I often can't assist but think of how very much like Adnan and Abdullah I would be if my family had arrived in America in, say, 1860. I'd be targeted for my heritage, considered a racial less-than, my people constantly caricatured equally dangerous and easily-controlled monkeys. I'd be the first drafted in war and the last considered for annihilation but menial labor. Like the people escaping a tragic political and religious quagmire in Iraq and Syria, I would be viewed simply as an economic burden. Like those people, I would be told that, because of my religion, I couldn't possibly obey the Constitution and laws of this country—Catholics considering the Pope is the caput of our organized religion, Muslims because the Quran demands submission to it. The Irish were simply folded into whiteness as a matter of convenience; information technology was easier for the powers that be to allow the states in and continue us at arm's length than it was to legislate against us and let us to uniformly become part of the anti-conservative swath of subjected peoples. And the anti-Catholicism of it all has never gone abroad: 1928 Autonomous presidential nominee Al Smith, the happy warrior, was cast by his opponents as a papist infiltrator—a la a Muslim brotherhood secret coven member—and suffered because of information technology; JFK got the same treatment. Hell, even post-conservative supervillain and White Firm principal strategist Steve Bannon has repeatedly assailed Catholic moralism.

Catholics, who as recently as 90 years agone, would have been the snake in Trump'south plow as spoken give-and-take artist, voted for Trump over Clinton, 52 percent to 47 per centum. We take been integrated, and the misery of our continental history has been forgotten; political convenience aside, we interfaced enough with other Americans for them to learn that the stereotypes attributed to u.s. were only allotted by our oppressors. Over time, we evolved from snakes into humans. And then we have forgotten that as nosotros fled war and famine and sectarian insanity over hundreds of years, we were treated like dirt, distrusted and told that our misery was only a smokescreen to help us infiltrate and destroy this land. We were pretty much what Muslims are now, here.

Yes, it would be stupid and dishonest to pretend that in that location is no major extremism problem in the Muslim community, and to dress downward those who fear extremist attacks is unfair. There is a contingent of Muslims, nations even, who desire to meet the devastation of America and the west—as we learned on 9/11, and several times since. And as FBI Manager James Comey testified to Congress, "I can't sit here and offer anybody an accented assurance that there's no risk associated with" allowing Syrian immigrants into the country. But there is besides ample evidence that immigrants in general are less prone to trigger-happy crime than their American-born counterparts. And in that location is historical shame in judging a people by their lowest common denominators and stereotypes.

Toward the end of Al-Bustan'southward meet and greet, things heat up. Musician and former refugee Hafez Kotain plays the tambourine and leads the oversupply in a series of folksongs, which most of the men in the crowd sing to; subsequently a few minutes of music, a couple of folks in the crowd start dancing. It's a merry scene—fitting the season—and Hazami Sayed, executive director of Al-Bustan seems to exist thrilled with how it all turned out. This was, after all, a articulation endeavour; American Friends Service Committee; Germantown Friends Schoolhouse's Human being Rights Club, Penn Arab Student Club (Pass); Greenfield Intercultural Heart; Pan-Asian American Community House (PAACH); and the Nationalities Service Center all pitched in.

Al-Bustan was started in 2002 as a way for Sayed's children and other children of Center Eastern descent to explore their heritage and acquire Arabic. It started modestly, as a part time project for Sayed, but has grown steadily since 2002. "We at present accept programs in schools, in the community and at the Academy of Pennsylvania. We do concert series, nosotros have a presenting arm, an ensemble and two education arms, as well equally a summertime military camp," Sayed says.

We take forgotten that as we fled war and famine and sectarian insanity over hundreds of years, we were treated similar dirt, distrusted and told that our misery was just a smokescreen to help united states infiltrate and destroy this country. Nosotros were pretty much what Muslims are at present, here.

Al-Bustan'south new art project is called (Dis)placed: Explorations in Poetry, Art, and Music Composition, drawing from the work of Syrian composer and Pew fellow Kinan Abou-afach; Lebanese poet Nazem El Sayed; Syrian creative person Buthayna Ali; and Tunisian artist eL Seed. Throughout the twelvemonth, the artists volition hold readings, exhibits, performances and discussions about the feel of being displaced. Sayed says that the works will also include Philadelphia refugees, those displaced by gentrification.

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Al-Bustan'southward mission is not only to create a community for refugees, but to prove the world what problems they face—from unemployment to institutional bias to simple homesickness—and who they are. They are Adnan and Abdullah, who play soccer, and Hafez Kotain, who leads the kids in a little drum circle at the end of the outcome; they're the kids who run around the Friends Center, and the moms and dads who drink java and sing along with folk songs. They're the modern reflection of what many of us were at one time. Italian terrorists. Irish mongrels. English and French cultists. All were people, and all were labeled the snake.

Sayed says that Al-Bustan wants to have another run across and greet around March, open up to the public this time. I advise yous to bank check it out, and to meet the people you lot once were.

Photos taken at Al-Bustan Seeds of Culture's Open House "Ahlan" result, Oct 2016, at Trinity Heart for Urban Life. Images past Fleck Colson